The invention relates to a method of testing a connection which includes a conductor in an integrated circuit, the conductor being coupled to an external connection terminal of the integrated circuit, which method includes the following steps:
applying a stimulus to the external connection terminal, PA1 detecting a response in the conductor in the integrated circuit, PA1 characterizing the functioning of the connection on the basis of the response.
The invention also relates to an integrated circuit which includes a conductor for conducting a current and a detection device for characterizing a current through the conductor.
A method and an integrated circuit of this kind are known from U.S. Pat. No. 5,068,604 in the name of Applicant. The known integrated circuit includes a plurality of supply connections, each of which is connected to a common supply source, the supply connections also being internally interconnected. The test aims to check whether each of the supply connections is correctly connected to the supply source and conducts a relevant part of the supply current to the internal part of the circuit. To this end, a voltage difference is measured across some internal points in the conductor and it is checked whether this voltage difference remains within a given margin. To this end, the known integrated circuit includes a comparison circuit for comparing the voltage difference. A problem encountered while using this test method is the fact that the voltage difference to be measured is small since the conductor has a low, process-dependent resistance so that it is difficult to execute the above test. A further problem consists in that the complexity of the test increases as there are more supply connections, each of which is connected to a common supply source.